Breakfast Casserole

For Father's Day at the lake this past weekend my happy was making brunch:)  I did a fresh fruit salad (the key is adding a little bit of honey & splenda to fresh fruit for the perfect touch), I admit I bought a coffee cake...it was delicious and I recommend it to anyone though.  I got it at the bakery at Kroger in the heights (homemade apple coffee cake).  I don't even want to know how many sticks of butter they put in that it tasted so good!  And, I served my breakfast casserole.

See Nutrition info. at the bottom, not bad at all!

**Prep this the night before for an easy breakfast or brunch. Find turkey sausage in the freezer section of the supermarket with other breakfast meats.  If your local market doesn't carry turkey sausage, get the reduced fat Jimmy Dean sausage.

Yield: 12 servings (serving size: about 1 cup)**

Ingredients

• Cooking spray
• 12  ounces  turkey breakfast sausage
• 2  cups  1% low-fat milk
• 2  cups  egg substitute (egg beaters)
• 1  teaspoon  dry mustard
• 3/4  teaspoon  salt
• 1/2  teaspoon  freshly ground black pepper
• 1/4  teaspoon  ground red pepper
• 3  large eggs
• 16  (1-ounce) slices white bread
• 1  cup  (4 ounces) finely shredded reduced-fat extrasharp cheddar cheese
• 1/4  teaspoon  paprika

If you would like to add green onion or a vegetable like cooked spinach or mushrooms feel free to!

Preparation

1. Heat a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Coat pan with cooking spray. Add sausage to pan; cook 5 minutes or until browned, stirring and breaking sausage to crumble. Remove from heat; cool.

2. Combine milk and next 6 ingredients (through eggs) in a large bowl, stirring with a whisk.

3. Trim crusts from bread. Cut bread into 1-inch cubes. Add bread cubes, sausage, and cheddar cheese to milk mixture, stirring to combine. Pour bread mixture into a 13 x 9–inch baking or 3-quart casserole dish coated with cooking spray, spreading egg mixture evenly in baking dish. Cover and refrigerate 8 hours or overnight.

4. Preheat oven to 350°.

5. Remove casserole from refrigerator; let stand 30 minutes (I cooked mine directly after taking it out of the fridge, and it turned out great). Sprinkle casserole evenly with paprika. Bake at 350° for 45 minutes or until set and lightly browned. Let stand 10 minutes.

Nutritional Information

Calories: 184 (33% from fat)

Fat: 6.8g (sat 3.2g,mono 1.5g,poly 0.8g)

Protein: 15.9g

Carbohydrate: 14g

 

Now, feel satisfied & energized for the day!